Can you speak Italian? By now, many of you have passed the beginning stages of learning to speak Italian and can read and comprehend quite a bit of the language. Meraviglioso!

But have you tried to take the next step to speak Italian fluently? Can you tell the story of your family history in Italian, using the passato remoto past tense?

Can you speak Italian the way you would speak in your native language, with complex and varied sentences? This is more difficult than it may seem at first, and it is something that I am always working on!

This series will focus on the situations that have come up most frequently in my everyday conversations with Italian instructors and friends. The “Speak Italian” blog series willfocus on the type of sentence structure and vocabulary we all need to remember to be more fluent when we speak Italian!

Let’s take that giant step from simple beginning sentences to more complex and fluid sentences in Italian by learning how to use the different Italian past tenses more easily. In this segment, we will focus on the Italianpassato remoto past tense and describe the similarities and differences between the passato remoto and the passato prossimo and imperfetto past tenses.

Included in the dialogue for this blog are examples of Italian hypothetical phrases in the past tense, reprinted from a previous blog on this topic.

If you need to refresh your memory on when to use the passato prossimo form of the past tense versus when to use the imperfetto, please visit the third blog post in this series, Speak Italian: A Story About… Love!

In the dialogue to follow, we listen in on a conversation between an Italian mother and her daughter, Francesca and Maria, who are preparing a welcoming party for an Italian-American relative who is visiting the family for the first time. You may remember the characters from our recent Italian Subjunctive Mood Practice blog posts.

When reading the example dialogue below, notice the use of the imperfetto past tense (for making general statements about the past) and the passato remoto past tense (for describing actions that began and were completed in the past). The use of these tenses shifts from one to the other while Frances is narrating the story of her family, depending on the situation that is described. The passato remoto past tense verbs will be underlined.

You will notice Italian hypothetical phrases in the past tense in this dialogue as well, which will use the imperfetto subjunctive mode and the trapassato past tense, since this dialogue is a reprint from a former blog on Italian hypothetical phrases. If you would like to review how to make Italian hypothetical phrases in the past tense, please see our blog: Italian Subjunctive (Part 5).

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Speak Italian: Passato Remoto –
The Story of a Family Reunion

It was a lovely spring day in April in the mountains of Abruzzo. Frances and her daughter Mary met at Frances’ house in order to plan a party.

The Italian passato remoto past tense is used in textbooks to describe historical events that took place centuries ago, and also in textbooks that describe art history.

Outside of scholarly works written in Italian, the passato remoto is still commonly found as a narrative tool in novels and other forms of fiction written today.

In fiction today, the author of a novel will often use the passato remoto form for the voice of the narrator. The passato remoto is useful for the “detached” feeling it gives to the narration in descriptive passages that relate completed events in the “remote past” of a character’s life. The passato prossimo is the past tense form usually used by the characters during their conversations, in order to give a “realistic” feeling to the dialogue.

The English translation for the passato remoto is the simple past tense, as English does not have an equivalent tense to the passato remoto. In effect, the different Italian past tenses can express certain shades of meaning which cannot be expressed by the past tense verb forms in English.

Although the passato remoto and the passato prossimo are used to evoke different feelings in the reader of an Italian novel, grammatically speaking, the passato remoto can be considered interchangeable with the passato prossimo. This is because both past tense verb types describe completed eventsthat took place during a given period of time in the past.

Note that the imperfetto remains important for works of fiction as well, as the passato remotocannot be used to replace the imperfetto! We remember that the imperfetto is used to describe an ongoingaction or event, while we have just reviewed that the passato prossimo describes completed actions or events.For a review of the specific uses of the imperfetto, please refer to our blog Speak Italian: A Story About… Love!

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Since our focus to this point has been on conversational, rather than written Italian, a common convention regarding stories told in conversation should be noted here. In both English and Italian, the present tense is very often used to tell a story that the speakers understand to have happened in the past. For instance:

Kathy: (Past tense to introduce setting.) “Yesterday, I met Janice.
Kathy continues: (Switch to present tense to tell the story):
“And she says to me… And then I say to her…”

This simplifies matters – no complex, little used past tense is needed to tell a story! But, if one wants to expand their conversational Italian to include the ability to narrate a story about the past formally, the passato remoto is an important tense to learn.

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We should also note here that in certain southern regions, and particularly in Sicily, it is the normal convention to use the passato remoto instead ofthe passato prossimo. In these regions, the idea that the passato remoto should be reserved for remote events or narration is not adhered to, and the passato remoto is instead chosen to speak about any past eventthat took place within a given period of time.

Speak Italian: “Passato Remoto” Past Tense You Will Need to Know…

“Passato Remoto” – “Avere” and “Essere”

The most commonly used form of the passato remoto is the third person singular of essere, which isfu.

The first and third person singular of avere, which is ebbi, is also commonly used.

Even if you don’t plan to continue to learn the passato remoto tense, remember these two verbs, as you will surely encounter them when reading Italian! The full conjugations of these irregular verbs are given for completeness. The stressed syllables have been underlined.

Avere—to have—Passato Remoto

io

ebbi

I had

tu

avesti

you (familiar) had

Lei

lei/lui

ebbe

you (polite) had

she/he had

(se) noi

avemmo

we had

(se) voi

aveste

you all had

(se) loro

ebbero

they had

Essere—to be—Passato Remoto

io

fui

I was

tu

fosti

you (familiar) were

Lei

lei/lui

fu

you (polite) were

she/he was

noi

fummo

we were

voi

foste

you all were

loro

furono

they were

Speak Italian: “Passato Remoto” Past Tense You Will Need to Know…

The “Passato Remoto” Regular Conjugations

Unfortunately, before we even begin to conjugate verbs in the passato remoto, it should be noted that the passato remoto has many, many exceptions to the regular conjugation. But luckily, the use of the passato remoto in novels is usually limited by the narrative form chosen, which will normally be in the first person or third person singular. This in turn limits the number of endings necessary to learn.

Also, certain verbs are used over and over in a novel in the passato remoto form – those needed to keep the flow of dialogue going, such as: said, asked, answered, went, and came. So, even a limited knowledge of this verb form is very useful for understanding a work of Italian fiction.

For this blog, we will describe how to conjugate the passato remoto, but then focus only on the most commonly used verbs in the singular first and third persons.

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To conjugate the passsato remoto past tense…

As usual, we must first make our stem from the infinitive –are, -ere, and –ire verbs. The method used to form the stems for the passato remoto is easy – just drop the –are, -ere, or -ire from the infinitive verb!

Then, we add the endings for our passato remoto conjugations to the stems.

However, a quick look at the table below, and you will notice that, for all persons except the third person singular, each ending for the passato remoto begins with the first vowel that we have just removed from the stem!

So if it makes it easier for you, think of the endings for the –are, -ere, and -ire vebs
as being the same,except for the third person singular.

Using the above method for the third person:
For the –are verbs, the third person ending will be -ò,
for the -ere verbs the ending will be -é,
and for the -ire verbs, the ending will be -ì.

After another glance at the table below, it soon becomes apparent that the first and third persons for the -ere form of the passato remoto form will not be unique ( the first person -ei ending will be the same as the conditional tense and the third person é is almost identical to the present tense; the third person plural -erono is identical to the future).

Therefore, there are alternate -ere endings.
The -ere endings used most often will instead be: -tti for the first person singular,-tte for the third person singular, and-ttero for the third person plural.

Passato Remoto Endings for –are, -ere, -ire Verbs

Infinitive
Verb

(All Forms)

-are

-ere

-ire

io

(i)

ai

ei (etti)

oi

tu

(sti)

asti

esti

isti

Lei/lei/lui

ò

é (ette)

ì

noi

(mmo)

ammo

emmo

immo

voi

(ste)

aste

este

iste

loro

(rono)

arono

erono

irono

When pronouncing the passato remoto verbs, the stress will always be on the first vowel of the ending. Except, of course, for the third person singular, where the ending has only one vowel and the accent reminds us that this vowel must be stressed.

Notice that andare has a regular conjugation in the passato remoto! Also, because the -etti , -ette and -ettero forms for the -ere first and third persons are used most frequently, these are listed first.

Passato Remoto – Regular Conjugations

Andare

(to go)

(went)

Credere

(to believe)

(believed)

Finire

(to finish)

(finished)

io

andai

credetti (credei)

finii

tu

andasti

credesti

finisti

Lei/lei/lui

andò

credette (credé)

finì

noi

andammo

credemmo

finimmo

voi

andaste

credeste

finiste

loro

andarono

credettero (crederono)

finirono

Speak Italian: “Passato Remoto” Past Tense You Will Need to Know…

“Passato Remoto” Common Irregular Verbs

Since there are so many irregular verbs in the passato remoto past tense, we present in the table to follow only the most commonly used verbs – and only in the first person io and third person Lei/lei/lui forms. Notice that some of these irregular forms fall into groups, which are listed together.

Since the passato remoto is often used for historical purposes, it should be mentioned here that although nascere (to be born) is irregular in the passato remoto, morire (to die) is regular!

Now that you have an example story of one family’s history, try to write a narration of your own family history using the passato remoto and imperfetto past tenses. Check the conjugations in the last section if you need to when you use the passato remoto for narration!

Here are some questions you might ask a relative to get started:

What relatives came to America?

What year did they come to America?

What was the family situation in Italy when they left?

How did the family members who were left behind manage in Italy?

How did the family members who went to America manage?

Did any of the family return to Italy? Why?

Did the family stay in touch despite being separated? How?

Was the separation difficult? For whom and why?

Did the relatives who were separated ever meet again?

Did the children in the separate families ever meet?

Kathryn Occhipinti, MD, author of theConversational Italian for Travelersseries of books, is a teacher of Italian for travelers to Italy in the Peoria and Chicago area. “Everything you need to know to enjoy your visit to Italy!”Join myConversational Italian!Facebook group and follow me onTwitter at StellaLucente@travelitalian1 and start tolearn Italiantoday forFREE!Conversational Italian! Facebook GroupTweet Stella Lucente Italian

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